Train kills truck driver, conductor in Aba

A yet-to-be-identified articulate truck driver has been reportedly killed in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State by a cargo train.

The incident, our reporter gathered, occurred at a railway crossing located behind the popular Cemetery market in Aba South Local Government Area of the state.

Sources at the scene told our reporter that the driver of the articulated truck and his conductor died at the spot.

According to them, the train was reportedly returning to Aba from Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

A source, who pleaded anonymity, said that the body of the conductor was evacuated in the night while the body of the driver was evacuated Thursday morning by the Aba Railway authority.

Narrating the incident, a source at the location who gave his name as Kingsley Okoro said: “The driver of the truck, we learnt brought ice fish to a warehouse located near the railway. We was said to have finished offloading the fish before his truck got stuck at the middle of the rail track.

“The driver was said to have made frantic attempts to move away the truck from the rail track. Luck was said to have ran out of him when the passenger and cargo train coming back from Port Harcourt to Aba suddenly surfaced.

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“The driver and the conductor couldn’t escape as the train rammed into the stationary truck while the driver was trying to fix his spoilt car.

“The body of the conductor, we learnt was taken away in the night from the point where the train dragged the car to while the body of the driver which was trapped under the car was later taken away in ambulance this morning.

“The identity of the driver and the conductor were yet to be known.

“The cold room has remained a ghost land as many of its customers who came in the morning, on hearing the news and to possibly avoid police arrest, avoided the cold room.”

Attempts to speak with the Aba Railway authorities failed as some of the personnel claimed that they were not authorized to speak with the press.